DANCE REVIEW

DANCE REVIEW; A Collective Wrestling With the Human Spirit

By ANNA KISSELGOFF

Published: March 9, 2001

How much should be read into Mark Morris's dance pieces is open to debate. At his best, as he was on Wednesday night at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, he left the choice up to the viewer.

The Mark Morris Dance Group's printed program included English translations and the original texts to clarify the German lyrics sung with two works, ''Bedtime'' and ''Beautiful Day.'' The same was provided for the Latin text of ''Gloria,'' Mr. Morris's rousing setting of Vivaldi's Gloria in D.

It is a virtue, not a fault, that one can do without such specifics and still be moved by the general gist of the action onstage. Something dramatic is going on here. Whether one knows that the narrative thread in ''Bedtime'' is based on Goethe's erl king, an evil spirit who abducts a boy, Mr. Morris's image of a frightened youth dying in his father's arms is transmitted all the same.

It isn't osmosis that does the trick; it is a firm understanding of how the human body expresses emotion. Mr. Morris is no slouch at experimenting with formal structures but he is no formalist. At root, he is a modern dancer of the old school, using movement as a signature for the passions of the heart. His ''Gloria,'' danced to a hymn in praise of God, suggests a collective wrestling with the spirit, not a sectarian struggle.

At the other extreme, he is apt to rediscover a witty score like ''Divertissement'' by the French composer Jacques Ibert. Mr. Morris uses it for ''Lucky Charms,'' the gorgeously ebullient crowd pleaser that opened the second program of his company's season in the Howard Gilman Opera House at the Brooklyn Academy on Wednesday evening.

For all its cheerfulness, ''Lucky Charms'' is not a slight work. With its kick lines, marching-band aura and male and female cheerleaders in sequined tops, it evokes ritualized celebration in all cultures. In this universal Fourth of July romp, the men (Charlton Boyd, John Heginbotham, Bradon McDonald and Gregory Nuber) and women (Marjorie Folkman, Lauren Grant, June Omura, Mireille Radwan-Dana, Kim Reis, Anne Sellery, Julie Worden and Michelle Yard) move in and out through fast-moving contrapuntal patterns, skimming waltzes and mysterious totemic images. The zaniness of Ibert's music, drawn from a score for a hilarious silent film (''The Italian Straw Hat'') is matched by the topsy-turvy choreography. Something is always askew.

Mr. Morris perfectly captures the festive simplicity of a French avant-garde, epitomized by composers like Ibert and Erik Satie. Craig Smith conducted the Orchestra of Emmanuel Music, as he did for ''Gloria.'' Here Mr. Morris's own deliberately simple images have none of the obvious sophistication of ''Lucky Charms.'' Instead, there is a kind of New World earnestness that contrasts with the exultant spirit of the Latin Mass.

Onstage the 10 dancers in gray are involved in a pilgrim's progress, however painful: a man propels himself forward on his stomach, a woman steps hesitantly, feet apart. This motif recurs throughout the ever-expanding piece as the chorus and two fine singers, Eileen Clark and Clare Stollak, rejoice in the pit.

The choreography is in Mr. Morris's early blend of the graceful and the clunky. (The 1981 piece was revised in 1984.) The movement is plain, rounded around the edges, and it suits the vernacular mood of Mr. Morris's people's mass. The final jubilation strikes a stirring note.

In ''Beautiful Day,'' it takes some time for the choreography's broad strokes to suggest that Kim Reis is a soul in pain comforted by Joe Bowie. Mary Westbrook-Geha, a mezzo-soprano singing the lyrics set to music attributed to Bach and sometimes to Georg Melchior Hoffmann, provides a clue. Here the program notes are helpful.

Mr. Bowie is outstanding, a dancer of quicksilver transitions and full-bodied dimension. In ''Bedtime,'' set to three songs by Schubert, he was the father who chose not to save his son. David Leventhal, a brilliant dancer of a more balletic type, was the terrified boy, and Charlton Boyd was a witty bogeyman, the erlking. The tale's fear and turbulence are universalized through the singers, the heightened gestures of the silent storyteller, Mireille Radwan-Dana, and the ensemble, which acts as a chorus and scenery. In all, a fable fabulously retold.